Chapter Text
'If I'm made up of molecules, they all pretend I have form, but I'm not sure. I've learned that I am Matter, I don't want to matter no more,"
Chapter 1
The Undercity always sounded different when you were alone.
When Vi and the boys were with her, the lanes had a rhythm. Boots on iron grates, Claggor’s heavier steps, Mylo’s constant talking, Vi’s sharp whistle cutting through it all like a knife. Together, their noise made the dark feel smaller. Like it had edges.
Alone, everything was just… there.
Drips from overhead pipes counted out seconds. The distant churn of the sump pumps breathed like a sleeping beast. Somewhere far off, a drug-addled man laughed too loud, then stopped too suddenly. Powder pulled her coat tighter, even though it didn’t really do anything against the wet.
Her eyes stung again. She scrubbed at her cheek with the back of her hand and got grease for her trouble.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.
She hadn’t meant to run. She hadn’t meant to shove past Vi and run off to who knows where. She hadn’t meant to—
Mylo’s voice echoed in her head anyway.
“Don’t touch that, you’ll break it.”
“Vi, tell her to stop trailing behind.”
“Vi, she’s gonna get us killed.”
It wasn’t even the words, not really. It was the way he said them like they were facts. Like everyone agreed. Like Powder’s presence was a problem they just hadn’t fixed yet.
Vi hadn’t agreed. Vi never agreed. But she didn’t always stop him fast enough. Sometimes Vi looked tired, and Powder could feel the tiredness like a weight sitting on her ribs.
So Powder had tried to be quieter. Smaller. She’d tried not to trip. Not to drop things. Not to get excited. Not to ask questions.
And then she’d found a spring-loaded hinge in a scrap pile. A beautiful little thing, still intact. And she’d been so happy she’d held it up, smiling like an idiot.
Mylo had snatched it away and flicked it like it was trash. “Great, you found junk.”
Claggor had told him to knock it off, but he’d said it anyway. He always said it anyway.
And Powder…
Powder had felt her throat go tight. Her eyes had gone hot. Vi had started to say her name—Pow—like she could catch her with it.
Powder bolted.
Now she crouched in a hollow between two collapsed ventilation ducts, surrounded by the sweet, sour stench of old chemical runoff. She sorted through a scatter of metal shards and broken housings, fingers moving automatically.
A small gear. Bent, but maybe salvageable. A cracked lens. A length of copper wire, still good.
She stuffed them into her satchel, jaw clenched so hard her teeth hurt.
I’m not a burden. I’m not. I’m not.
Something shifted above her.
Powder froze.
She’d learned early: in the undercity, the dark didn’t mean empty.
Another sound—soft, careful footsteps. Not drunk. Not heavy. Not scampering like the street kids when they were hungry enough to steal.
Measured.
Powder slid the gear into her pocket without looking, like hiding it could hide her. She held still, listening.
A faint scrape. Then a whisper, just loud enough to be a whisper someone meant to hear.
“Well. This is charming.”
Powder’s head snapped up.
A boy stood at the edge of the broken ducts above her, balanced like he belonged there. He wasn’t undercity. Not in the way she knew. His clothes were too clean, his boots too intact. Even in the dim, she could see the sharper cut of his jacket and the better stitching, like it had been made to fit him instead of made to survive.
He held a small notebook in one hand and a pencil in the other. A strap crossed his chest with a rolled-up piece of paper tucked under it.
His hair was blond, messy in a way that looked accidental until you noticed it fell away from his eyes just enough to make him look sophisticated.
The smile, when it arrived, came slow and sure, like he’d decided the world was going to like him, and it was rude of it not to.
Powder’s heart slammed.
Piltover.
Not an enforcer. No uniform, no baton, no hard eyes. But Piltover all the same.
She scrambled backward, hitting her shoulder on rusted metal. The sound rang in the hollow.
The boy blinked, surprised for half a second. Then he lifted both hands, still holding pencil and notebook, as if surrendering to someone with a gun.
“Hey there,” he said. “I’m not here to - well, I’m not here to do anything to you. That sounded weird. I mean-”
He stopped, then tried again with more confidence.
“I’m not dangerous.”
Powder snorted before she could stop herself. It came out watery, angry.
“No one comes down here if they’re not dangerous.”
He tilted his head, like he was studying her the way she studied broken machines. Like he was figuring out what part of her was cracked.
“Not me. I just came down here because it’s interesting,” he said. “Which is… different.”
Powder’s fingers tightened around the strap of her satchel. She looked for exits. There were two narrow gaps between the ducts and one route back into the main lane.
If he was with someone, if there were enforcers waiting…
She didn’t see anyone else. But that didn’t mean they weren’t there.
“What are you doing?” she demanded. Her voice came out sharper than she felt. “You lost?”
His smile widened, like she’d just offered him a compliment.
“Lost?” he repeated, offended by the concept. “No. Absolutely not. I’m exploring.”
Powder narrowed her eyes.
“Exploring?” she echoed, like the word was something she could throw back at him.
He stepped down from the duct, landing lightly on a beam that shouldn’t have held him. Somehow it did. He made a little show of it—arms out for balance, boots sure, chin high.
“I’m Ezreal,” he said suddenly, like announcing his name could settle the question of whether he belonged here.
“And you are…?”
Powder stared. Her first instinct was to lie.
Undercity kids learned to lie before they learned to read. Names were handles. Give someone a handle, and they could grab you.
But he didn’t look like he knew what to do with a handle. He looked like he assumed everything already belonged in his hands.
“Powder,” she said anyway, chin lifting in defiance. If he was going to know it, he could choke on it.
“Powder,” Ezreal repeated, like he was tasting the sound. “That’s-”
He searched for a word that sounded impressive enough.
“That’s memorable.”
Powder’s eyes narrowed further.
“What do you want?”
Ezreal looked genuinely puzzled. He glanced down at his notebook, then back at her, as if the answer was obvious.
“I told you. I’m exploring,”
“This isn’t a museum. Go home,”
Ezreal’s brows knitted, taken aback by Powder’s rudeness. He looked down, then back at her with confidence bordering on arrogance.
“I want to map the Undercity,” he said.
Powder blinked.
“What. Why.”
He looked at her like she’d asked why the sun bothered rising.
“Because no one has done it properly,” he replied. “At least, no one with any sense of detail. And because…” He straightened, posture suddenly too big for the cramped space. “I’m going to be a famous explorer someday, and famous explorers have maps.”
Powder barked a laugh. It sounded wrong. Too loud.
“You? Famous?” She gestured at his clean clothes. “You’ll fall in a chem-drain and cry for your mom.”
Ezreal’s expression didn’t even flicker. If anything, he looked amused.
“I don’t cry,” he said simply.
Powder rolled her eyes.
“Everyone cries.”
Ezreal considered this with exaggerated seriousness, then shrugged.
“Well, when I do, I’ll do it tastefully.”
Powder stared at him.
He stared right back, as if daring her to be impressed.
It was infuriating.
It was also… weirdly easier than thinking about Mylo.
Powder shifted her weight, still ready to bolt.
“You’re gonna get robbed,” she said. “Or stabbed.”
Ezreal lifted his chin.
“Then I suppose it’s fortunate I’ve found someone who knows the terrain.”
Powder frowned. “What.”
He smiled wider, bright as a flare in the dark.
“You,” he said. “You’re clearly a local. And you’re clearly not busy, because you’re sitting in a pile of scrap like it’s your throne.”
Powder’s mouth opened and shut.
She was busy. She was doing something important. She was -
She realized, suddenly, that he was looking at her cheeks like he’d noticed the dried tear tracks under the grime.
Her face burned.
“I’m fine,” she snapped.
Ezreal held up his hands again.
“I didn’t say you weren’t.” His voice softened just a fraction. “Look, I’m not asking you to take me to… wherever people go to get murdered down here. I just need someone to point out where things are. Names. Landmarks. Shortcuts.”
Powder’s suspicion flared again.
“Why should I help you.”
Ezreal sighed like the answer was painfully obvious.
“Because it will be interesting,” he said. “And because I’ll pay you.”
Powder’s eyes narrowed. “With what.”
Ezreal reached into his pocket. Powder tensed, expecting a weapon. He pulled out a small coin. Bright, clean, Piltover-stamped. It caught what little light there was and flashed.
Powder’s breath caught before she could stop it.
It wasn’t the money itself, not really. It was the fact that he had it so casually, like coins were just things you carried and forgot about.
Ezreal flipped it between his fingers like it was nothing.
Powder hated him a little bit.
“I don’t need your coin,” she said, too fast.
Ezreal’s smile didn’t fade. He slipped the coin away.
“Fine,” he said. “Not coin. A trade, then.”
Powder crossed her arms.
Ezreal tapped the rolled-up paper at his side.
“I have a blank map,” he said. “You have the knowledge. I make the map. You get a copy. That way you know your own lanes better than anyone.”
Powder stared.
It was stupid. Pointless. A map didn’t change anything down here.
And yet -
She pictured Vi, stubborn and brave, leading them through alleys like she owned them. She pictured Mylo, sneering, saying Powder was dead weight.
A map meant being useful.
A map meant knowing something other people didn’t.
Powder swallowed.
“I don’t know you,” she said, because distrust was safer than hope.
Ezreal leaned closer, lowering his voice as if the Undercity itself might be listening.
“You don’t have to,” he said. “You just have to know the streets. And you clearly do.”
Powder hesitated. The hollow felt colder.
She thought about going back to Vi and the boys empty-handed. Thought about Mylo’s smirk.
Then she looked at Ezreal again. At the way he stood like he expected the world to make room for him.
Maybe it would be fun to watch him get scared. Maybe it would be satisfying to prove she wasn’t the only one who didn’t belong somewhere.
“Fine,” she said, sharp. “For one day.”
Ezreal’s grin lit up the whole gloom.
“Excellent,” he said. “We’ll start with-”
Powder cut him off.
“You do what I say,” she warned. “No wandering off. No talking to people. No being stupid.”
Ezreal put a hand to his chest, mock wounded.
“Powder,” he said, “I’m never stupid.”
Powder rolled her eyes so hard it hurt.
“Yeah,” she muttered, standing. “We’ll see.”
They moved out into the wider lanes, where the air tasted like metal and old smoke. Powder kept half a step ahead, watching shadows, watching eyes. Ezreal walked beside her with his notebook open, pencil poised like he was about to sketch the whole world.
He looked around like he was trying to memorize everything at once.
“Right,” he said, voice low with excitement. “So this area is…”
“The Sump,” Powder corrected. “But not the Sump. Just a sump lane. Don’t call it the Sump unless you wanna sound like a topsider.”
Ezreal scribbled quickly.
“Noted,” he said. “Sump lane. And this pipe…”
“Don’t touch it,” Powder snapped.
Ezreal’s hand froze inches from a steaming conduit.
He looked at her.
Powder lifted her eyebrows.
“It’s hot,” she said flatly. “And it leaks sometimes.”
Ezreal pulled his hand back like he’d meant to do that.
“Of course,” he said. “I was… testing the air.”
Powder snorted again.
Ezreal didn’t seem offended. He kept walking, head turning from one detail to the next. He jotted notes constantly: angles, corners, names Powder gave him.
“Okay,” he murmured, half to himself, “so if we take a left here, it leads to…”
Powder stopped.
Ezreal almost walked into her.
“What,” he said, annoyed.
Powder pointed.
A group of older boys leaned near a shuttered stall, eyes sharp, hands idle. One of them had a scar running down his cheek like a crack in glass. They watched Powder, then looked at Ezreal.
Clean clothes. Topsider boots. Easy target.
Powder felt her stomach tighten.
She leaned close to Ezreal’s ear.
“We’re turning around,” she whispered.
Ezreal’s brows drew together.
“But the lane-”
“We’re turning around,” Powder repeated, voice harder.
Ezreal opened his mouth to argue.
Then Scar-Cheek pushed off the stall and started walking toward them.
Powder grabbed Ezreal’s sleeve and yanked him, dragging him back the way they’d come.
Ezreal stumbled, startled. “Hey! what are you-”
Powder didn’t let go. She kept walking fast, not running but close.
Behind them, Scar-Cheek called out.
“Oi! Nice jacket, boy!”
Ezreal’s shoulders stiffened. He tried to glance back.
Powder yanked his sleeve again. “Don’t.”
Ezreal’s jaw tightened. “They’re just-”
“They’re gonna take your stuff,” Powder hissed. “Or worse.”
Ezreal’s pride flared in his posture like a lantern.
“I can handle a few-”
Powder stopped abruptly in a narrow alley and shoved him against the wall.
Ezreal blinked at her, shocked.
Powder leaned in close enough to smell the soap on his collar. It made her angry all over again.
“You want to be famous?” she whispered fiercely. “Then do what I say if you want to be alive.”
Ezreal stared at her for a long second.
Then, surprisingly, his arrogance softened into something like understanding.
He nodded once. “All right,” he said quietly.
Powder released his sleeve, breathing hard.
They waited. Listened.
Footsteps passed the alley mouth. Slow, searching.
Powder held her breath.
Ezreal did too.
The footsteps faded.
Powder let out a slow exhale.
Ezreal looked at her, eyes bright in the dim.
“…That,” he said, “was thrilling.”
Powder glared.
“You’re insane.”
Ezreal’s grin returned, smaller but real.
“Maybe,” he admitted. “But you’re good at this.”
Powder’s throat tightened in a way that had nothing to do with crying. She looked away fast.
“Yeah,” she muttered. “Whatever.”
They took a different route after that, one Powder knew was safer. Ezreal kept writing, but he stayed closer now. Listened more.
After a while, the silence between them shifted into something less sharp.
Ezreal asked questions. Too many, but not cruel. He wanted to know why some bridges were avoided, why certain doors had marks, what names meant.
Powder answered because it felt… strange, being asked like her answers mattered.
Eventually, Ezreal’s curiosity landed on her satchel.
“What’s in there?” he asked.
Powder tightened her grip.
“Stuff,” she said.
Ezreal leaned a little, trying to see.
Powder stepped away. “Don’t.”
Ezreal raised his hands again in surrender.
“Right,” he said. “Secrets.”
Powder frowned.
It wasn’t secrets. It was scraps. It was proof she wasn’t useless.
They reached a small, half-collapsed workshop space, abandoned long ago, but dry enough inside to sit. Powder used it sometimes when she needed to tinker away from everyone’s eyes.
She hesitated at the entrance, then nodded for Ezreal to follow.
“Here,” she said. “We can mark the lanes from above. There’s a vent shaft upstairs.”
Ezreal’s eyes widened as he looked around.
The place was littered with old machine parts and broken tools. A rusted vise. A half-disassembled pump.
To Powder, it was comfort. To Ezreal, it looked like treasure.
“You have a workshop,” he said, awed.
“It’s not mine,” Powder snapped quickly. “Just… somewhere I go.”
Ezreal walked carefully, like he was afraid of breaking something.
Powder huffed.
He was a topsider, but he wasn’t… careless. Not in the way she expected.
Ezreal crouched by a pile of gears and touched one gently.
“This is brilliant,” he murmured.
Powder blinked.
“It’s junk.”
Ezreal looked up at her, genuinely confused.
“How is this junk,” he said, gesturing at the parts, “when it’s clearly the bones of machines? You could make anything from this.”
Powder’s chest tightened.
You could make anything from this.
No one said things like that. Not Mylo.
Powder set her satchel down, hands suddenly clumsy.
“I fix things,” she said, defensive. “Sometimes.”
Ezreal sat back on his heels, smiling.
“I knew it,” he said, like he’d solved a puzzle. “You’re not just a scrap hoarder. You’re a tinkerer.”
Powder’s cheeks warmed.
She busied herself pulling out parts. Wire, the small gear, the lens.
Ezreal watched her, elbows on his knees, chin resting on his hands.
“You make explosives?” he asked casually.
Powder froze.
“…Sometimes,” she snapped, too loud.
Ezreal blinked. “I was kinda joking. You really make bombs?”
Powder scowled. “Duh, you think someone as small as me can fight off jerks by myself?”
Ezreal’s smile turned sly.
“Based on your spunky attitude, I’d thought so,” he said.
Powder stared.
She didn’t know how to respond to that.
So she did what she always did when she didn’t know.
She threw a small bolt at him.
Ezreal yelped, startled, and it bounced off his shoulder harmlessly.
Powder’s mouth twitched.
Ezreal rubbed his shoulder dramatically.
“You are violent,” he accused.
Powder’s lips curled into something almost like a smile.
“Shut up,” she said, but it didn’t sting like before.
Ezreal laughed - quietly, like he was afraid to scare the moment away.
Powder looked down at her hands and realized something that made her stomach twist.
For a few minutes, she hadn’t thought about Mylo at all.
—————————————————————
They climbed the vent shaft like it was a game.
Powder moved first, quick and sure, fingers finding grips in the rusted metal like she’d been born climbing it. Ezreal followed, slower. He tried to pretend he wasn’t breathing hard.
“I’m fine,” he grunted when Powder glanced back.
Powder rolled her eyes. “Sure.”
Ezreal huffed. “I’ve climbed cliffs.”
“In Piltover?” Powder shot back. “What, like… stairs?”
Ezreal made an offended sound.
“They have proper cliffs,” he insisted. “Just outside the city. Very scenic. Very-”
He slipped.
Powder reached down automatically and grabbed his wrist. His glove was soft. The skin under it was warm.
Ezreal went still, startled by the sudden support.
Powder hauled him up with surprising strength, then let go fast like she’d touched something dangerous.
Ezreal stared at her hand, then at her face.
“…Thank you,” he said quietly.
Powder shrugged, pretending it didn’t matter.
“If you fall, it’ll take forever to drag you out,” she muttered.
Ezreal’s smile was smaller now, less showy.
“Still,” he said. “Thank you.”
They reached the top and emerged into a narrow space where the ceiling opened into a broken grate. From here, you could see a slice of the lanes below. People moving like shadows, neon signs flickering, steam rising.
Ezreal drew in a breath like he’d never seen anything so beautiful.
Powder didn’t get it. It was just home.
Ezreal pulled out his rolled-up paper, flattening it against the metal floor. He held his pencil like a weapon and started sketching.
Powder leaned over, watching.
He was… good. His lines were confident. Quick. He marked distances by eye, mapped turns with surprising accuracy.
Powder frowned.
“You’ve done this before,” she accused.
Ezreal didn’t look up. “Of course.”
Powder narrowed her eyes. “For what.”
Ezreal hesitated.
His pencil stopped.
For the first time since she’d met him, his confidence wavered in a way he couldn’t hide with a grin.
Powder watched the pause like it was a crack she could pry open.
Ezreal’s voice, when he spoke, was quieter.
“My parents were explorers,” he said.
Powder blinked. She hadn’t expected that.
“Real ones,” Ezreal added quickly, as if afraid she’d laugh. “Not like… hobbyists. They went to places no one goes. They brought back artifacts and stories. Everyone in Piltover talked about them. Like they were legends.”
Powder listened. Her fingers curled against the edge of the paper.
“And you wanna be like them,” she said, more statement than question.
Ezreal nodded, then forced a smile back onto his face.
“I’m already halfway there,” he said. “I’m in a place no one from Piltover bothers to understand. I’m making a map. That’s… important.”
Powder scoffed. “It’s just paper.”
Ezreal looked up sharply.
“It’s proof,” he said, voice suddenly hard. “It’s mine. It’s something I can point to and say—see? I did this. I went here. I survived it. I’m not just—”
He stopped himself.
Powder’s eyes narrowed.
“Not just what,” she asked, too softly.
Ezreal’s jaw tightened. His gaze flicked away, out toward the lanes, as if the Undercity was safer to look at than whatever he was about to say.
“…Not just someone’s kid,” he finished.
Powder’s chest tightened unexpectedly.
She understood that. Too well.
She thought about Vi, always rushing ahead, always taking the hits, always—always. Powder thought about being the small one behind her, the one everyone watched like she might break.
She thought about Mylo calling her a burden.
Powder swallowed.
“Where are your parents now,” she asked, voice rough.
Ezreal’s pencil moved again, fast, like drawing could cover up what he felt.
“They’re… gone,” he said.
Powder’s stomach dropped.
“Gone?” she echoed.
Ezreal’s mouth twisted into something that wasn’t a smile.
“An expedition,” he said. “Shurima. They were supposed to come back with something incredible. They didn’t.”
Powder didn’t know where Shurima was, really. She’d heard the name like a myth. A desert so big it could swallow people whole.
She pictured it swallowing Ezreal’s parents the way the Undercity swallowed people every day.
“And what,” Powder said slowly, “they just… didn’t come back?”
Ezreal shrugged, too casual.
“Piltover says they’re missing,” he said. “The council says it’s tragic. People say nice things at parties.”
Powder frowned. “Parties?”
Ezreal glanced at her, and there was something sharp in his eyes.
“In Piltover, tragedy is like… entertainment,” he said. “You talk about it, you feel sad for a moment, then you move on.”
Powder stared. For a second, she saw Piltover not as shining towers but as people who could afford to stop caring.
Ezreal swallowed. His voice softened again.
“I’m going to find them someday,” he said.
Powder didn’t laugh. She didn’t mock.
Instead, she found herself saying, “You can’t.”
Ezreal stiffened. “Excuse me?”
Powder pointed at the map. “You can’t find people with paper. You find them by… by being strong. And… and knowing things. And…” Her voice wobbled. She hated it. “And not getting scared.”
Ezreal stared at her.
Then he smiled, not arrogant this time, but bright with something like relief.
“Why do you think I’m doing this?” he said.
Powder looked away quickly, blinking hard.
They climbed down and spent the rest of the day weaving through Zaun.
Powder showed him the places Vi used as shortcuts, the market lanes where you could blend into crowds, the bridges you didn’t cross unless you wanted trouble.
Ezreal marked everything. He asked questions. He listened.
And somehow, between the mapping and the walking, Powder found herself talking.
At first it was small things. How the pipes hissed more in winter, how the air tasted different near the river.
Then it slipped into bigger things, like her hands couldn’t hold it in anymore.
“My sister,” Powder said suddenly as they walked under a low archway, “she’s… she’s the best.”
Ezreal glanced at her. “Vi,” he guessed, remembering a name Powder hadn’t meant to share earlier.
Powder stiffened. “How-”
Ezreal tapped his notebook. “You said it when you were mad,” he said. “It stuck.”
Powder’s cheeks warmed. “Yeah,” she muttered. “Vi.”
Ezreal waited.
Powder kicked a pebble into a puddle. The splash was small.
“She takes care of us,” Powder said quietly. “Me and… Claggor and Mylo. She’s always… she’s always trying to make things better.”
Ezreal nodded, eyes attentive.
Powder swallowed.
“And I’m…” Her voice caught. She forced it out anyway. “I’m the thing that makes it worse sometimes.”
Ezreal’s brows drew together.
“What do you mean.”
Powder’s shoulders tightened as if she could make herself smaller and safer by force.
“Mylo says I’m slow,” she said, voice flat. “He says I mess things up. He says… he says Vi should leave me behind.”
Ezreal’s expression sharpened, anger quick and quick to show.
“He says that?,” Ezreal asked, like he didn’t believe someone could say something so cruel out loud.
Powder nodded, looking at the ground. “He’s just… he’s just joking.”
Ezreal stopped walking.
Powder halted too, surprised.
Ezreal looked at her with a seriousness that didn’t fit his age. Like he’d suddenly stepped out of the role he’d been playing.
“That’s not a joke,” he said.
Powder’s throat tightened.
“It is,” she insisted, because if it wasn’t a joke then it meant something worse. “It’s just… he picks on me because I’m little.”
Ezreal’s eyes narrowed.
“No,” he said. “He picks on you because he can.”
Powder’s eyes burned again.
She hated that Ezreal could see her so clearly. She hated that he didn’t look away.
Powder swallowed hard.
“I try,” she whispered. “I try to keep up. I try to help. But when something goes wrong, everyone looks at me like. Like they’re waiting for me to break it again.”
Ezreal stepped closer, careful, like approaching a skittish animal.
Powder’s hands clenched into fists at her sides.
Ezreal didn’t touch her. He just stood there and looked at her like she mattered.
“You know what I saw when I found you,” he asked softly.
Powder blinked.
“A kid in a scrap pile,” he said. “A kid who didn’t run from the dark. A kid who knew where to step and where not to. A kid who had the sense to save my life when I was about to wander into trouble.”
Powder stared.
Ezreal’s voice warmed, gaining confidence. Not arrogance, not show, but something steadier.
“I saw someone who knows things,” he said. “Someone who can make things. Someone who…” He hesitated, searching. “…who cares.”
Powder’s eyes filled.
She hated it.
Ezreal’s smile returned, gentle.
“That boy,” he added, with sudden sharpness, “is an idiot.”
Powder let out a wet laugh that sounded like it tore itself out of her.
Ezreal shrugged like it was obvious.
“If he can’t see you’re useful, then that’s his problem,” Ezreal said. “Not yours.”
Powder wiped at her face quickly, furious at the tears.
“You don’t know me,” she muttered.
Ezreal’s grin turned sideways.
“I know enough,” he said.
Powder glared at him through watery eyes.
Ezreal’s eyes sparked with mischief.
“And if he keeps bothering you,” Ezreal added, “you could always invent something that explodes in his shoes.”
Powder stared.
Then she laughed again. Harder this time, realer.
Ezreal beamed like he’d won a prize.
——————————————————————
The sky over Zaun never really got blue, but the light did shift as the day dragged toward evening. The neon signs came alive, brighter. The air grew colder. People moved faster, heads down.
Powder and Ezreal walked the last stretch in quieter rhythm, the map rolled up now with new inked lines and scribbled labels. Powder could tell Ezreal was tired. His steps got heavier, his shoulders less perfect, but he didn’t complain.
Powder felt… strange.
Like she’d been holding something heavy for a long time, and someone had taken it from her for a while without asking.
She didn’t trust that feeling. It couldn’t last.
They reached the lane that led to The Last Drop.
Powder slowed.
Ezreal’s gaze lifted toward the warm glow spilling from its windows. Music leaked out, muffled by walls. The sound of laughter. Voices.
Home.
Powder’s stomach twisted.
She should be mad. She should march inside and glare at Mylo and pretend she didn’t care.
But now her anger felt… tired. Like it had burned too long and left ashes.
Ezreal stopped beside her.
“This is it,” Powder said, voice flat, like stating facts made them safer.
Ezreal looked at the building with open curiosity.
“The Last Drop,” he read, squinting at the sign. “Charming.”
Powder shifted her satchel higher on her shoulder.
She glanced at Ezreal, suddenly aware of how clean he was compared to her. How out of place he looked.
He’d done all this. Walked the lanes, listened to her. Just because he wanted a map.
Or maybe because he wanted to feel like someone important.
Powder understood that too.
Ezreal turned toward her and held out his rolled map, then paused.
“Oh,” he said, as if remembering something. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his coin again. The same bright Piltover coin.
Powder’s eyes narrowed immediately.
“I said I don’t need-”
“I know,” Ezreal cut in quickly. “This isn’t payment.”
Powder frowned.
Ezreal flipped the coin once, caught it, then held it out toward her.
“This,” he said, “is proof.”
Powder stared at it suspiciously.
“Proof of what.”
Ezreal’s smile softened into something earnest.
“That you helped make this,” he said. “That you weren’t… you know.” He made a vague gesture, searching for the right word. “Invisible.”
Powder’s throat tightened.
She didn’t want the coin. Not really. It felt like Piltover. Like charity.
But she looked at Ezreal’s face, at the way he held it out like it mattered, and something in her chest shifted.
Powder reached out slowly and took it.
It was heavier than she expected. Cold in her palm.
Ezreal’s grin brightened.
“Good,” he said. “Now you can’t deny you were part of an important expedition.”
Powder snorted, closing her fingers around it.
“You’re still gonna get stabbed someday,” she said, but her voice lacked bite.
Ezreal put a hand to his heart again, dramatic.
“Powder,” he said, “have some faith.”
Powder rolled her eyes.
Then, before she could overthink it, she asked the question that had been hovering at the edge of her all day.
“…Will I see you around,” she muttered, eyes fixed on the ground.
Ezreal blinked.
For the first time, his confidence looked almost startled. Like he hadn’t expected her to want anything from him.
Then his smile returned, warmer.
“Sure,” he said simply. “If you want.”
Powder’s cheeks warmed. She hated that too.
“I don’t want,” she snapped reflexively. “I just… If you’re gonna wander around like an idiot, someone should keep you from dying.”
Ezreal laughed quietly.
“A noble duty,” he agreed.
Powder stepped backward toward the door.
Ezreal didn’t move to follow. He offered a small salute with his pencil.
“Until next time, Powder,” he said.
Powder hesitated, coin still warm in her fist.
Then she gave him a quick, awkward nod and turned.
She pushed the door open and stepped into the warmth.
Noise hit her all at once—music, laughter, the smell of food. Her eyes adjusted.
Vi spotted her almost immediately. Relief washed over Vi’s face so fast it hurt to see. Claggor followed, looking worried. Mylo looked annoyed, like Powder had inconvenienced him by existing.
Powder’s stomach tightened.
Vi moved toward her, mouth already forming her name.
Powder’s fingers closed harder around the Piltover coin in her pocket.
It grounded her.
She didn’t look back out the door. She didn’t want to see Ezreal standing there like some secret she wasn’t allowed to have.
But later, when Vi hugged her tight, when Powder mumbled apologies into Vi’s shirt, when Mylo muttered something under his breath and Powder didn’t burst into tears,
Powder found herself thinking about the map.
About the pencil lines turning chaos into something you could understand.
About a boy with too much confidence and not enough fear, who had looked at her like she mattered.
Outside, the door swung shut.
Ezreal stood in the shadowed lane for a moment longer, listening to the muffled warmth inside.
Then he rolled the map tighter under his arm, squared his shoulders, and turned back toward the dark.
He had places to chart.
And now, somewhere in the Undercity, someone might be waiting to call him an idiot.